The Mission
by evalentine
Summary: Ianto Jones is on a mission of vital importance. Trouble is he's lost and there is this divine being who keeps trying to persuade him not to complete the task. Set middle Season One.


Ianto Jones was on a mission. A very important mission. A mission vital to his future. Time was of the essence; it was crucial he get to the appointed place because it would be there he would reach his destiny and meet his fate. He was running out of time and it didn't help that he was lost.

When he began the mission he had a clear idea of exactly where he needed to go. The fact that he was lost was odd, because he was the not the sort of person who got lost. He could read a map; give him a compass and a map and... He didn't need a map he knew this place like the back of his hand.

He had the route in his head down a bit, round the corner, down a corridor, turn right, then left… or was it left then right. Or was it up… then down…this way… then that way,…stairs… there were stairs he recalled but did they go up or down?

He looked around the small enclosed space he found himself him in. What was even more frustrating was he was someplace in the Hub he had never come across before. He leaned up against the wall he found and had somehow fallen against. Bloody convenient really because without it he would have fallen down. '_Very useful things walls for holding people up,'_ he reasoned. Perfect place for a wall you would think it was there just for him.

It was strange that the mission had gone pear-shaped because he had planned it with such care.

Wait until a very busy period, this was perfect, three days on the run, everyone was exhausted and had been sent home for at least 24 hours, except Jack. Hide. Get Jack out of the Hub by setting off a small fake Rift alert; go to Lisa's room, bang, followed by a much bigger bang.

'_How difficult was that_?' he asked himself. _'Not difficult at all!'_ He let out a sigh and looked around; everything was so blurry. Worse than blurry. He waved his hand; it had a kind of swirly movement with loads of different colours. It was mesmerising. '_Enough of looking at the pretty whirly colours,' _he admonished himself_. _He straightened himself and felt himself falling forward. '_Nope still needed that_ _wall._' And he fell back against it.

An idea came to him. Maybe he could use the wall as a guide. If there was a way in, there had to be a way out. Slowly he moved his way forward and came to a dead end. Worse, there were some large square objects in the way that for the life of him he could not recall what they were, but they had four sides, were one on top of the other and they were stopping him from reaching the far end of the wall.

Right, he was lost. He admitted defeat. He felt a moment of anxiety and his breathing hitched up a notch. The others would find him. He didn't want them coming across his body; it would all be messy and overly dramatic. Anyway he had caused them enough grief. The whole point of getting to the special place was no one would ever find him. He looked about, but as this place was clearly a room in the Hub he had never come across the likely hood was no-one else knew about it either. He felt a calmness descend as he made his decision.

He pulled up his hand; perfect, he still had the object. Now he needed the special bits, the one's he had put aside for this moment. Lifting his other hand he reached for his pocket. He tried to think why his arm wasn't working. He wiggled his fingers which was indication he still had a hand. Looking down he saw his left side was pressed against the wall trapping his arm. Turning he put his back against the wall and used his legs to brace himself preventing himself from sliding to the ground.

His arm came free and he reached into his jacket pocket. With effort he pulled out five small cylinders with the flat grey tops. All he had to do now was put them in the black object. He tried to slide the top bit to fit the cylinders into the black object. He huffed; he knew how to do this: slide the thingy, click the do-da, slip out the whatsit, push the bits in, snap the whatsit back into place, then snap the top on the do-dacky, and pull the trigger. Oh missed a bit, hold gun to head then pull the trigger.

He looked at the bullets and the gun in turn. He knew he had to fit them into the gun otherwise no bang. And as that was the whole purpose of the mission, it was very annoying. He tried again but the bullets were not cooperating and seemed to have taken on a life of their own as they jiggled about and then they were gone.

He heard them fall to the floor scattering. "Bugger," he snorted.

"No bullets! Can't blow my brains out with no bullets," he declared. An intriguing thought came to him: maybe he didn't need them, maybe he just needed the gun. He put the gun to his head and pulled the trigger but nothing happened, he tried again. He had never blown his brains out before but he was sure there would be a loud explosive noise and a flash all at the same time. At the least there should be a click. Something was not right. He studied the gun. Turning it over slowly, he couldn't see anything wrong. It must be empty which meant the bullets really were essential.

He studied the floor. He was pretty sure bullets couldn't move on their own so should be here somewhere. He slid on to his hands and knees and began running his hands across the surface of the floor. It took several moments to realise he was stuck again. He looked up; his head had come across another wall. He cursed, now the bloody walls were ganging up on him. A thought came to him and he backed up then turned slowly and was rewarded with more floor to search.

Several moments passed as he swept his hands back and forward, maybe bullets really could move on their own and were being sneaky. He stopped, better come up with a plan so they couldn't get away. "I only want one of you," he stated, "two at the most. Let's do a deal, let me have one of you, two sorry, then the rest of you can go free!" He listened intently for a reply but heard nothing, well not nothing but definitely no bullets replying to his request. He stopped to think, '_How do bullets reply? Do bullets have a language? If they did, did he speak bullet?'_ He screwed up his face in thought, and then shook his head. _'Nope he was pretty sure he didn't.'_

"Right you little buggers, no mercy for you, I use the lot of you," he stated out right.

'_How could he have lost the bullets?'_ He asked himself. Blowing you brains out was easy, any idiot could do it. He had all the right equipment, intent, the plan, everything. So it had to be the fault of that red liquid in the wonderful shaped bottle.

He had only meant to have quick taste but it was so delicious he had had quite a bit. Not sure how much because he had stopped counting when he had lost the ability to count which was after one. It had come through the Rift a few days ago and Owen was trying to work out its contents and it was just sitting on his desk. It was alien bootleg from out of space, scramble your brains Owen had told him. It was a spur of a moment act as he passed, he wasn't going to have any brains, why not give it a try. He was rarely reckless but in this case it didn't matter and he had always curious about alien food and liquor, this was his last chance. As he thought back he realised that maybe he should have taken the drink with him to Lisa's room then as a final act taken a drink.

He put his hand out and found it blocked. There was a strange object blocking his hand. He tried to put a word to it but only 'foot' came to mind. Something foot in a cover of some kind, and now there were two. Electrical currents in his brain found connections. If there was a foot then this might belong to a leg, if there was a leg he was sure it would have a body. Maybe the bullets had heard his offer had sent for help. He lifted his eyes and he was right; a knee which meant a leg followed by a body. A hand swam front of his eyes. Next he was on his feet; he could see it was a being all blue, grey and red. He focused and saw the being was moving an opening in its head and sounds were coming out.

He tried to concentrate. 'W_as this bullet language_?' he asked himself. He was sure if bullets could speak it would be lots of quick noise like a machine gun...b,b,b,b bang. Then as he took a breath he found he could understand.

"Ianto what the hell are you doing?" Jack said trying to figure out why Ianto was in the small storeroom just off the Hub holding a gun and reeking of alien bootleg.

"I need your help. I am on a very important mission. Mission obli, obivi-lion, sorry no lions," he lost his train of thought for a moment then taking a breath he continued," I've lost my bullets. I can't complete my mission without the bullets, I need the bang." He lifted the gun to his head to find it snatched out of his hand.

He pursed his lips and tried to get his gun back because it was vital to complete the mission. In all his mental briefings the gun was vital to his plans because he was pretty sure the bullets wouldn't work without it. After several difficult moments he stood back out of breath. He tried again but no matter how hard he tried the being wouldn't let him have it back.

Shaking from the effort to retrieve the weapon he held out an arm to steady himself and found arms around him. He pulled back to have a better look. The being was glowing with a halo of light.

He let himself fall forward and buried his head in the being's shoulder. It was all warm and spicy.

"You smell nice," he said taking a deep breath as he tried to figure what and who this otherworldly being was when a thought came to him.

"You've come to collect my soul haven't you?" He pulled away. "Sorry I'm a bit late, because I'm lost. If you could push me in the right direction you can take my soul, soon as I'm done." The being made no move to help except to keep him upright.

"Ianto," Jack shook him as held him by the shoulders.

Shuffling forward he braced Ianto by leaning him into a wall. Momentarily hands free Jack removed the magazine from the gun he had taken from Ianto and emptied it of bullets. The safety was still on which was the only reason he could see Ianto was still alive.

"Listen," Ianto said as the being now held him up examining him. "Are you going to help me or not?"

"Ianto, no," Jack told him, distressed.

"Your loss," Ianto replied as he studied the being, intently thinking how handsome he was.

"Ianto, I can't begin to tell you what it would have been like to come in and find you had killed yourself," Jack argued.

"That's the trouble with suicide, it's bloody selfish," he swayed, creasing his face in concentration as he tried to see if he could find the bullets on the floor from this height. "I'm not a selfish person but I figured as this was going to be the final act in my life I was allowed one monumental selfish act," he explained.

"Ianto I know things have been strained but none of us would want this," he told him.

"It wasn't meant to be, not meant to just find me, I had a bigger bang planned. You see, there was to be the bang," he mimicked a gun with his fingers to his head," that would set off a bigger bang and I would be buried. All very simple, everyone is out, they won't think of looking, if they did they would think it's a cave in or something, no one goes down here not since… not since… " he put his hand in his pocket and pulled out what looked like a detonator to find it snatched from his hands.

"You are beginning to piss me off, I don't think you are here to help me at all," he burst out angrily as he pushed Jack away who staggered back and was looking at him in horror at the full implications of his words and actions hit him.

Jack took Ianto by the shoulders again. Ianto struggled free as he saw the open door.

"You are more important than you could possibly imagine," Jack said as Ianto stumbled towards the door.

"Listen, my life needs to be over, it has to end. I am ending it, trust me everyone will be better off."

"That is not true," Jack said distressed. "I can think of several people who would he devastated."

Ianto stared at him then began pointing his finger at him as a look of understanding grew on his face. "I know what you are you're an angel trying to earn its wings. You're going to tell me how worse everyone's life would be better if I lived or not," he explained. "Don't bother there are seven." He stopped and counted on his fingers. 'Eight people, sorry ten people whose lives would have been far better off if I had never existed but as I do, I'm correcting the mistake."

"Ten?" Jack said bewildered.

"Dad, mum, sister, Lisa, Annie, Doctor Tanizaki, Owen, Tosh, Gwen, and Jack,"

"You are not a mistake, never think that ever," Jack argued as he tried to steer Ianto clear of the door that led out of the storeroom.

"Listen all I have ever brought is hurt and pain. So don't fill me up with any crap about how happy and joyful life can be."

"Dying's easy Ianto, its living that's hard trust me I know."

Ianto pushed his face towards the being. "What the fuck would you know, you know nothing about pain. I am in pain every day, every waking moment. Two people died because of me, I might as well as killed them myself." He pointed his fingers in a stabbing motion into his own chest. "And I betrayed everyone who trusted me. I've lost everyone who ever meant anything to me," he shouted pointing his finger now at the being. "I just want to die, then it's over, so if you are not going to help them get the fuck out of my way." He threw his arm sideways as he struggled to get free.

"I don't want you to die. I want to help you work through this," Jack said as he attempted to restrain him.

"That's not the kind of help I want," Ianto told him through gritted teeth as he fought to get past the being. Jack fought with every ounce of strength to prevent Ianto from leaving the confined space of the storeroom. While he was here he was contained, but if Ianto got out he wasn't sure he could keep him from harming himself long enough to call for help. The drink he had taken had several properties; one of them was to make your muscles over-perform making him much stronger than normal.

When it fallen through the Rift he had cursed because he knew from bitter experience the effect of this liquid on humans. It was distilled from certain venoms and had hallucinogenic effect than relegated LSD to a harmless powder in comparison. He had wanted to destroy it outright. The only reason for its presence in the Hub was Owen had argued that the compounds could be useful and wanted to see if he could extract them. Now he was so grateful of that because it had saved Ianto's life. It had caused him to become completely disorientated by putting him into an altered state of mind. From Ianto's reaction he figured he was experiencing the well-known halo effect, maybe he could use it to his advantage.

"Okay, okay, okay," Jack panted through ragged breaths after several frantic moments passed. "I will help you but only if we make a deal."

"What sort of deal?" Ianto said as he fell back.

"I will help you but only if you explain why you want to kill yourself," he said using his own body to block the door.

"If I tell you will you take me to Lisa's room?" Ianto said suspicious at the being's sudden change of tactic.

"Yes, that's the deal; tell me and I will help," he promised as Ianto swayed. Ianto thought after looking at the being for several moments and he took a breath.

" I need you to swear on whatever it is angels swear on and I'm sorry you won't get to earn your wings this time," he added.

"Promise I swear on everything I hold dear," Jack agreed as Ianto fell towards him and together they made their way to the main area of the Hub.

* * *

><p>"Start," Jack indicated as he helped Ianto to sit on the sofa and started to search for some restraints. Right now Ianto was calm but knew he could turn on a hair. Pulling out the drawers from his desk he tipped them onto his desk top. Three drawers down he found what he was looking for. Grabbing the cuffs he went and stood in front of Ianto who was sitting his eyes gazing towards the water tower<p>

"Hold out your hands," he instructed

"What are those?" Ianto asked as he saw the being holding out glittering circles of silver and gold.

Jack thought for a moment. "Celestial bracelets; once you finish telling me what all this is about they will help transport us to Lisa's room," Jack explained as he snapped first one around Ianto left wrist and the other around the pipe running along the back of the sofa. Jack leant against the wall in an effort to recover from the fight in the storeroom.

"I hurt," Ianto began.

"That I understand you tried to kill yourself," Jack said as he now checked how much of the alien bootleg Ianto had drunk. From what he could tell it was about a eighth. He knew Ianto would pay for every sip but right now that was the least of his concerns.

"No I really hurt. For weeks and weeks my back, any movement it's agony, lying down makes it worse, can't rest. I'm okay just standing but some days it's so bad I can hardly walk. Only thing that helps is heat, I've spent hours in the shower tyring ease the pain."

"When did this start?" Jack checked out as he now started to go through Ianto's pockets to make sure he had nothing else on him that he could hurt himself with.

"Started at Canary Wharf. It was terrible after Lisa, it started getting slightly better but after the Brecon Beacons it flared up, even worse."

"Did you talk to Owen?"

Ianto shook his head. "He just told me I should expect pain after being thrown around, and that whining to him was not going to get any sympathy and to stop walking around like I had a rod up my arse, and while you're at it get me another cup of coffee this one's gone cold," he said in one breath as he mimicked the physician's voice. He saw the look of concern grow on the being's face.

"Did he? Well I will be having a long talk with Owen," Jack told him.

"It's okay, I understood it's my punishment for letting people die and get hurt."

"Ianto, Canary Wharf and what happened on the Brecon Beacons were outside your control."

Ianto shook his head, "You don't understand. I know now my Lisa died at Canary Wharf. But a part of her was still alive; they kept her alive to keep fooling me. She begged me every day for the pain to stop. I could have done it, overdose her pain medication. How much did she suffer?" He broke down. "I tortured her in some terrible misguided attempt to save her..." he took a breath, "and to do it I betrayed everyone I worked with…and two people died. Owen is right I deserve to be punished," he said vehemently spitting out the words. "And I miss them."

"Them?"

"My best mates: David, Leon and Jared; their bodies were never found. In the course of an afternoon, I lost every one of my friends: work colleagues, everyone. Everyone I knew and worked with all gone. It was the one year anniversary last week. To them here they were the enemy, but not to me, never to me. There's no memorial, no one remembered, only me, 732 people gone and I got to thinking I can't pretend anymore."

"Is there anything else?" Jack encouraged as he contemplated the effect of his statements. He recalled how he and Owen in particular were the most outspoken in their hatred of Torchwood One. All Jack has seen was the megalomania compounded by the bitter infighting over policy. Those Ianto knew and worked with weren't responsible for any of that.

"I need you to do something for me," Ianto took in a sharp breath. "I didn't leave a note but as we've been talking I've been thinking, could you give a message to someone important to me?" he asked.

"Yes I can do that for you."

"Jack Harkness. I know I seduced him and that was wrong. Tell him I wasn't pretending, it meant something to me. Those moments we held each other, he made me feel like I was worth something and I miss him, will miss him."

"I promise," Jack said quietly as he took his hand in his. He looked up and saw Ianto's eyelids begin to droop as the sedative effect of the drink was finally taking hold.

"I know I'm taking a liberty but could I ask one more thing," Ianto asked as he began to slump towards Jack.

"If I'm able," Jack replied carefully as Ianto leaned into him.

"I know Jack always said there is nothing after death, not sure how he could know but you're here so, can you tell me will I meet my mum, on the other side?"

"How long since she passed?" Jack asked quietly stroking Ianto's face with his other hand.

"I was six. Dad always told me if I had been a better son, mum would have stayed. It took me a long time to figure what he meant but I think he meant if I had loved her more or said and done the right things, she wouldn't have killed herself."

"I'm sure she is waiting for you," Jack said not sure if he should confirm or deny but it felt right to give Ianto some comfort to keep him calm.

"I glad because I want to tell her I loved her very much and I miss her." Jack felt his soul ache for the man beside him. Ianto had endured so much in his short life and deserved more than a lonely death in some cold and dark forgotten basement.

"So now you understand, please take me to Lisa's room," he finished and sniffed.

"Soon Ianto I promise," he said gently. "The bracelets need to charge."

"When I'm done hand them this key," he took small key form his top pocket of his jacket and handed it over. "I packed everything up and put it in the storage facility." He felt his whole body getting heavier and he fought to keep his eyes open. He felt arms wrap round him and without thinking he buried his head against the being's shoulder. A hand came up and caressed the back of his neck and he leaned into the touch. For some reason he couldn't explain he couldn't hold back and sobs began to rack his body. How long the being held him he was not sure but with every passing moment he felt darkness enveloping him and he felt himself slip away into nothingness. _'So this is death,_' he heard himself say and then there was nothing.

* * *

><p>Fire, he was on fire. He attempted to move but found it impossible; the slightest movement was agony. He voiced his discomfort with a groan and tried to open his eyes but found it hurt too much. His head pounded and felt out of proportion like somehow it had swollen to a hundred times bigger. Voices...there was someone with him; he couldn't make out what they were saying. He tried to force his lips to move and make a sound. He panicked; he couldn't move, then he felt a touch; someone was holding his hand. He squeezed it and was rewarded with a squeeze back and the pain began to wash away and felt everything around him drift back into the dark.<p>

Voices...he was sure there were voices, and light. The light hurt but he needed to see. His eyelids felt very heavy but with effort he forced them open. PAIN hit him and he squeezed them shut. It was so bright. Time passed; he was not sure how much but the light dimmed and he opened them again. A face swam in to view.

"Sleeping beauty awakes," he recognised Owen's voice and he knew in that moment he had failed.

Jack took Ianto's hand and as tears flowed down Ianto's face. "It's okay we'll deal with this one moment at a time." Ianto turned his head away unable to face him and Jack thought it best to deal with this on a practical level.

"You're going to feel pretty horrible. The drink you took has some nasty side effects, one you will most likely be feeling right now is extreme muscle fatigue and soreness. You're also light sensitive so we've turned down the lighting as much as we can. You will have a headache from hell, the effect is known as fire head."

"While you were out Owen examined you. You have cracked couple of vertebrae but it's the muscle and ligament damage causing you all the pain. He says you need effective pain management, physio and some deep tissue massage to help with the healing. No quick cure but now we know we can make sure that you're on light duties once you return," he said gently as he ran circles with thumb on the back of Ianto's hand.

"Why couldn't you just let me die?"

"Ianto, you might not believe this right now but as angry as we were with you none of us here wanted you dead. We all want to help in any way we can to see you through this." He waited a few moments before he spoke again "I know as bad as things feel right now, they will get better"

"You can't know that."

"Ianto, losing those we love is the hardest thing we have to face. I don't think any the friends you lost at Torchwood One would want you to kill yourself; they would have wanted you to live on."

Ianto broke down and Jack put his arm over him as he continued to speak. "I've called a friend, Doctor Rachel Simpson she knows about what we do here. She is arranging some short term inpatient care to help you through right now. I had a look at the place on the internet; its low-key, more of a retreat than anything else. It has a spa facility and physio so they can start work on easing the problem with your back. And it's a place where you can take some time out and get some help

"I don't have choice do you I?" Ianto said bluntly.

"No, I will be driving you up there myself to make sure you get settled in."

"Why are you doing this?" Ianto asked as Jack enveloped his hands around Ianto's.

"You're an important valued member of our team and we need you, I need you," he said as he kissed his forehead.

Standing looking down as Jack spoke to Ianto, Owen watched wearily. It had been long 36 hours as the toxins from the bootleg broke down and made their way through his system. It was touch and go. There was no antidote and all they could do was treat each effect, mostly pain, as they occurred.

He heard the main Hub door roll back and he saw Tosh accompanied by Gwen walk across and join him.

"We've cleared all his boxes from the lock up," Tosh explained.

"There're at Tosh's if he asks," Gwen added.

"Was there much?"

"Just a few boxes, clothes mostly, a few books," Gwen replied.

"This is so sad," Tosh said as they watched Jack speak to him gently.

"What must it be like to lose every one you know?" Tosh said sadly.

"I guess we're finding out," Gwen added.

"Is there anything he needs?" Tosh asked gently as the observed Jack now encased both his hands around Ianto's and kissed them.

"I think he's getting exactly what he needs right now," Owen said.

"I've packed him several changes of clothes and his wash gear, and I threw in a couple of large towels, "Gwen advised as Owen noted a suitcase by her desk.

"Thanks, I'll let Jack know," Owen said as he watched as Tosh moved to an area they had set aside. Leaning up she lit the candle in the small niche in the wall. One small candle in honour of those who lost their lives at Torchwood One. She knew right now it was a poor gesture, but one she felt they had to make. No memorial, a small candle, one man. If nothing else the least they could do was ensure the last survivor knew those lost had not been forgotten.


End file.
